Deir al-Bahari
๐ Location: Luxor West Bank, below the cliffs of the Theban Mountain ย ยท ย ๐บ Period: 18th Dynasty ย ยท ย ๐๏ธ Tickets: ~360 EGP foreign adults
Deir al-Bahari ("the Northern Monastery", from a Coptic monastery that later occupied it) is best known for the Mortuary Temple of Queen Hatshepsut, the woman-pharaoh who ruled c. 1479โ1458 BC. Her architect Senenmut placed the temple against a near-vertical cliff in three colonnaded terraces, connected by ramps โ an extraordinarily modern design that still feels like a piece of 20th-century architecture two and a half millennia later.
The reliefs on the second terrace tell two famous stories. The southern colonnade depicts the Expedition to Punt (probably modern Somalia or Eritrea), with vivid scenes of giraffes, baboons and stilted houses; the northern colonnade depicts Hatshepsut's divine birth, justifying her claim to the throne. Her mortuary chapel and a small sanctuary of Anubis lie at the rear, and a separate Temple of Hathor opens to the south.
Two earlier temples occupy the same bay: the partly preserved Temple of Mentuhotep II (11th Dynasty, c. 2050 BC), which inspired Hatshepsut's design, and the ruined temple of Thutmose III.
Highlights
- Three-terrace Hatshepsut Temple with reliefs of Punt and the Divine Birth
- Chapel of Hathor with cow-headed columns
- Chapel of Anubis with vivid wall colour preserved
- Foundations of the Mentuhotep II temple next door
Visiting
- Opening hours: 6 am โ 5 pm
- Tickets: ~360 EGP foreign adults
- Best time: first thing in the morning โ the bay heats up like an oven by 10 am
- Nearby: Valley of the Kings, Ramesseum, Medinet Habu, Tombs of the Nobles